Lotta a fame e malnutrizione nel mondo

[Autom. eng. transl.] The problem concerns about 3 billion people, who live in those countries where agriculture is mainly based on small family farms (PAF), which FAO estimates are 450 million and have an average area of 1 hectare (FAO, 2014) . Assuming that this typical family is made up of 5 people, the corresponding rural population would be 2.25 billion, while the total population of those countries would rise to 3.2 billion (equal to about 40% of the entire planet), since It is estimated that 70% of the inhabitants live in rural areas. Finally, it is useful to add that the area cultivated by these PAFs represents about 30% of the world surface. Given this structural condition, if you want to increase food production there are two operational possibilities. The first is to promote the establishment of medium-large farms, in which to build extensive plantations, more or less intensive, in order to produce much greater quantities of food, imagining that the yields per hectare can easily and quickly become at least 2- 3 times the current ones. If well managed, these investments would significantly increase the food production of the beneficiary country without aggravating the environmental impact, but would hardly reduce the food security problems of the local poor (rural) populations. The cause lies in the fact that these greater availability of foodstuffs would be mainly destined for export, given that they constitute an important source of income through international trade and given that the population of the PAF would not be able to purchase them. Furthermore, the PAFs themselves would be further marginalized for the removal of land and not being able to take advantage of any technical support. The second possibility - preferable for us, even in a mixed system that also includes the first, provided that it is in balance with the latter - is to encourage the agricultural development of the PAF, to get them out of subsistence, improving the availability of food (also for nutritional quality) and generating a minimum necessary family income, to activate commercial and artisanal forms of all kinds.